Thighs Wide Shut

Snowden
Villians, Heroes, Ones & Zeroes
Official Site | Trailer & Mo
R | 134 min

Edward Snowden and his story must be told, as many times as possible.  It has been told thru the news, endlessly, and then again, personally, in the vital doc Citizenfour, and now Oliver Stone takes his crack, and you’d think it would be all kinds of crackpot-ted, but it’s actually crackerjack!

In fact – Stone’s Snowden is his best film since 1995’s Nixon!  Woah, that’s a long-ass time ago, and yeah, he’s kinda made nuttin but crap since then (although I thighly recommend his TV show ‘The Untold History of the United States‘), but maybe Ollie needed to circle the wagons before he could find himself again – railing against the system, while telling a good story

When watching Stone’s post Nixon output, I kept saying to myself – these don’t feel or look like Oliver Stone films.  They look like sh!t and they feel like a$$.  Maybe Ollie’s done with the 60s and 70s, but we weren’t done with Ollie’s 60s and 70s, but Snowden shows that in the 10s, and with the 1s and 0s, he can make a modern Oliver Stone movie that works, and one that we can be at peace with… while it’s at war, with the world!

As for the movie? Joseph Gordon-Levitt IS Snowden.  If you’ve seen Citizenfour (and you should), you’ll think that G-Levitt nailed it as Snowden.  And Shailene Woodley as his love interest?  She makes things lovely, and interesting, adding well needed humanizing to Snowden’s story, which I didn’t really expect from Stone, or from a spy story that mainly involves keyboards and monitors!

And the rest of the cast?  Outside of Nicolas Cage‘s oddly restrained role as a burned out g-man, Melissa Leo (nice and quiet), Zachary Quinto (forever intense with those eyebrows), Tom Wilkinson (nice Scottish accent!), Scott Eastwood (so glad we’ll have someone that looks like Clint for decades to come), Timothy Olyphant (always a jerk), Ben Schnetzer (keep an eye on this guy), Keith Stanfield (another one to watch), and Rhys Ifans (always a prick, always amazing) all help to shine a much needed light on the darkness that lies behind keeping our enemies at bay

Plus, most people aint gonna see a documentary, so it’s important that thee fictionalized movie gets it right, cause more people will see it, and this movie gets it right, and more people need to see it!

Verdictgo: Breast In Show

Snowden snowDOES it right, currently at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Debt
Paid In Mostly Half-Full
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 114 min

If Ciarán Hinds is in a movie, we will want to see it, and odds are that the movie will be at least decent.  So what if a movie barely has Hinds in it?  Decency is still possible, and John Madden‘s The Debt, a remake of (what we are assuming is a far superior) 2007 Israeli film, is pretty darn decent stuff.  A little poor in execution-ville, and plenty poor in climax-land, The Debt still had enough going for it to cash in its IOU.  It’s kinda like a ghetto Munich meets The Boys From Brazil.  And even ghettoizations of those revenge on Jewish boogeymen flicks is still something of interest, cause who doesn’t love watching Jewish enemies get their due????  (hactually, we wondered if Hollywood would EVER make a film where Muslims hunted down their enemies who have wronged them.  the conclusion we came to is probably never)

And if hunting Nazis in a non-over-the-top Tarantino kinda way isn’t your cup of tea, well, you can at least revel in the unexpected hilarity of Sam Worthington ‘trying’ on an Israeli accent for size.  Eeeesh!!  The guy’s got a face for cinema and a mouth for duct tape.  Man oh man!  At least they surrounded him with some class act(or)s like (underrated) Marton Csokas and (I’ve been everywhere this summer) Jessica Chastain.  In modern day times, Hinds is Worthington (even though he looks more like Csokas), Tom Wilkinson is Csokas, and Helen Mirren is Chastain in the membrane

So the modern stuff is where we begin.  The trio are far removed from their Mossad agent days and each other, cause they’re harboring some kinda secret.  But when we get shuttled to the past, which is the juicy bulk of the film, when the 2 dudes and redheaded hottie hunt down and capture a Josef Mengele-type jackass (Jesper Christensen).  Things don’t go right, but maybe they do, but not really, cause there’s a DEBT that has to be paid or like finished or something, which leads to the ending that has promise and kinda comes up empty, but it’s kinda satisfying, enough, sorta

Hey, did we mention that Ciarán Hinds is in it???

Hinds Wins: oh, you know nothing of Hinds and want to play ketchup?  See him in Rome, Munich, Veronica Guerin, Life During War Time AND mos def The Eclipse

Verdictgo: a mild Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Debt is cash sorta money, but not really, but kinda, today at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Conspirator
Herstory Always Repeats Itself
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 123 min

A good history lesson is a good history lesson, regardless of what kind of a movie surrounds it.  The Conspirator is one such good history lesson, cause we doubt you (or we) know the inner-workings of the conspiracy behind Lincoln’s assassination, or its aftermath, or the rushed (in?)justice of all parties linked to it, or supposedly linked to it.  What do you know of Mary Surratt?  No, she had nothing to do with A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte.  She may have had nothing to do with axing Lincoln either, but regardless, was tried for being a conspirator alongside all the real conspirators.  Is she really guilty or just guilty by association?  So many questions, so few answers, lots of stuffy courtroom drama, and it’s all worth learning about!!  There will be a quiz (show), so sharpen those number 2 pencils

The material is right up righteous director Robert Redford‘s alley, and even if the results may not be the 2nd coming of All The President’s Men, what is?  Cause the truth is out there, even if the government back then couldn’t handle it, or the exact truth was and remains unknown.  The same might be true of today’s prosecution/persecution of terrorists or would be ones!!  OOOOOOOH, WHAT MODERN DAY PARALLELS!!  And obvious ones too!!

So back to Mrs Surratt (an un-make-upped Robin Wright-Penn).  She had two things working in her disfavor:  1, her son was an accused Lincoln assassination plotter, who fled right after it all went down and thus looking even more guilty, and 2, her house served as a meeting place for all the plotters, including John Wilkes Booth (Sacha Baron Cohen lookish-a-like Toby Kebbell).  Besides some questionable testimony by some witnesses (including Stephen Root!!), there’s not much directly linking her in the larger plan, besides being a mother and owning a home.  That aint stopping an itchy Lincoln cabinet (Kevin Kline) and military court (Colm Meaney and Danny Huston) from exacting revenge and deciding her purty much pre-determined fate.  Who would and could defend such a defenseless woman and winless case?

Enter the reluctant Frederick Aiken (a solid James McAvoy), after his mentor Reverdy Johnson (Tom Wilkinson, who can never do no acting wrong) quit on this lose-lose situation (if she’s found guilty, you fail as a lawyer, but if you get her off, you’re seen as a traitor to the Union, and the new and uneasy post-Civil War peace).  Aiken starts off seeing his client juss like everyone else, beyond guilty, but as the ‘case’ unfolds, he starts to find the proceedings unfair, and most importantly, unjust.  He’s now made this lose-lose situation a lose-lose-lose one.  Even his trusted war buddies (James Badge Dale, and a way out of place and time Justin Long) and lady-in-waiting (Alexis Bledel) question his motives and actions, but it’s his case to fight, like it or not!!

If you don’t know the outcome of the case, skip the wikipedia entries and jump right into this open for interpretation history book.  Heck, you might juss learn something, unlike most movies, which make you un-learn things!!

Evan Rachel Wood co-stars as Mary’s daughter, Anna Surratt, and if yer looking to un-hate her from her NSFW awful daughterness doings in Mildred Pierce [do not click that spolierish link, if you ever intend to watch the mini-series], this juss another excuse for you to serve this summons

History Lives On:  you can visit Ford’s Theater (although it barely resembles the theater Lincoln was killed in) or follow Booth’s escape route [pdf] or even eat Chinese food at Mary Surratt’s Boarding House!!!

Verdictgo:  Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Conspirator plots it up today at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Green Hornet
Spinelessapple Express
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

Green Hornet, what can go wrong, did go wrong: wrong guy being Green Hornet (Seth Rogen), wrong to use a sophomoronic slacker script (Rogen again, with pal Evan Goldberg), wrong to enlist a surreal director and not have him go surreal (Michel Gondry)… this doesn’t bode well for Aronofsky’s Wolverine II, and wurst of all, juss an all around waste of a Green Hornet movie .  Played for laughs, and filled with none, Green Hornet has no buzz, sting or flight, well, besides anything having to do with Kato (Jay Chou).  He’s awesome, and how could he not be?  No seriously, he’s Kato and he’s mad awesomes and Jay Chou is awesomez as Kato!

Kato!!

Cameron Diaz is in it for some reason, but she’s more of a Charlie’s mangled than an Angel.  And remember that Christoph Waltz guy who stole our hearts and ears and the film Inglourious Basterds?  He delivers a mighty similar shtick here (with much less bitting dialog), but this time with a beard (looking like Carmen Ghia from the real Producers), and after 2 films of Americans seeing him do this, he’s already edging towards one trick pony territory.  Eeesh.  And poor Tom Wilkinson, David Harbour and Edward James Olmos.  Serious actors brought in for some serious roles, and for about as much seriousness as a Norm McDonald movie.  At least they employed Edward Furlong.  Sounds like he could use the money

KATO!!!

oh, and the 3-D is awful

KATO!!!!!!

Cole As Ice: Taylor Cole!!

Verdictgo: Only Kato Merit & Zero Stinkin Badges For The Rest

Hornet stungks this Friday at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…